


Exulansis

by clairell



Series: Obscure Sorrows [1]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Kissing, M/M, Rape Aftermath, Rape Recovery, Regret, but read it anyway, it's sad, slightly AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-11
Updated: 2017-01-11
Packaged: 2018-09-16 18:16:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9283988
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clairell/pseuds/clairell
Summary: n. the tendency to give up trying to talk about an experience because people are unable to relate to it—whether through envy or pity or simple foreignness—which allows it to drift away from the rest of your life story, until the memory itself feels out of place, almost mythical, wandering restlessly in the fog, no longer even looking for a place to land.OR,  Stiles was raped, and this is what happens afterward.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Both the word 'exulansis' and the definition come from http://www.dictionaryofobscuresorrows.com
> 
> AU in the sense that I can't pinpoint a time in which this would happen, but I assume around Season 4 (?)
> 
> Also, I do not own the characters or Teen Wolf
> 
> Enjoy!

In the interest of time, we’ll keep the backstory short.

It was nearly a year ago now, despite it not hardly feeling that long ago, that Stiles was raped.  It was some night, he and Scott had lied that they were staying at the other’s house and they stole away to San Francisco, an hour or so from Beacon Hills.  Scott had a friend or a cousin or a something who was having a get-together/party sort of thing in his loft.  There was alcohol, of course.  There were probably worse things that Stiles didn’t much concern himself with, until it wasn’t his choice. Scott had disappeared with something to make out with, and Stiles was alone, on the opposite end of a sectional where two people he had never met before were all but fucking.  He remembers not much but taking a sip of a drink someone gave him and feeling fuzzy, and then, sometime later, waking up in an alley with a gash in his forehead.

They caught the guy, Stiles’ dad being Sheriff and all.  He got twenty years, and Stiles got peace of mind.

Well.

He doesn’t much talk about that anymore.

He used to try.  He used to bring it up to Scott, who felt so guilty it hurt.  He tried with Lydia, with Malia, when they wondered why he shook so much when it came down to the dirty stuff. They gave him that pity, those tooth-rottingly sweet kisses, as if it would cure him of ache. He tried with his dad, who rattled statistics and told his stock standard stories of other victims he’d come across in his years on the force.

Talking is harder than not, so Stiles doesn’t.

+

Lacrosse is an exercise in forgetting.  

Stiles likes to focus on his heartbeat as they run laps, the rhythmic thud of his pulse giving him a beat to run to.  It’s not as though it makes him feel alive— in fact, he finds that he’s always hyper-aware of his being alive—it’s that it makes him feel _awake_.  He is perfectly conscious of the mud in his cleats and the sweat matting his eyelashes together.  It gives him a saneness like nothing else can.

It’s the locker room part that he hates.

He watches Liam take off his jersey and pads.  There’s no rush about it; he peels the sweat-saturated fabric from his skin and lets it fall into a pile on the floor, hot skin exposed at once.

It makes Stiles ache in a way he can hardly explain.  He envies the control Liam has in his disrobing and wishes he’d had that much control in his own undoing.  He envies the simpleness, the effortlessness Liam must feel in taking off his clothes.  There’s a certain vulnerability that comes in being naked, a vulnerability that Liam is seemingly unaware of, but a vulnerability that Stiles can’t help but shed, one that Liam could never understand.

How _do_ you tell one of your friends that you feel uncomfortable in your own skin without seeming like you need some kind of psychological evaluation?

Stiles supposes that you don’t.

+

Scott stays the night one Tuesday, after spending too much of his time trying to explain glycolysis to Stiles, who couldn’t focus to save his life.

They were little when they started sleeping over at each other’s houses.  Seven years old and full of giggles, they stayed up as late as their little brains would allow, telling each other fart jokes and talking about which girls they thought were cute.

Now, it was different.  Their talks were calmer, more serious, usually about something supernatural.  The urgency was no longer there; the need to talk and talk was replaced with the need for sleep.

They climbed into their respective sides of the bed.

“Stiles?”  Comes the whisper after a while.

“Yeah?”

“I was wondering if you were still awake.”

“Yeah.”

Scott sighed.  “You know I’m sorry.  If we could change places—”

“I wouldn’t.  It’s fine, man.  I don’t even think about it anymore.”

They turned away from each other then, both too comfortable with the lie between them.

+

It’s one of those nights when sleep feels on the other side of the world from Stiles, and Derek’s house is only on the other side of town.

“I don’t have all that much food, but I think there’s cereal in the cupboard next to the fridge.”

“You got milk?”  Stiles asks as he pries himself off the couch and goes to make himself a bowl.

“No?”

Stiles rolls his eyes.  “Well, don’t you have chips or something?”

“There’re carrots in the fridge.”

Stiles grumbles a little, but settles on a bowl of carrot sticks.  When he settles back on the couch, he takes note of how unrestricted his heart feels, how at ease.

They play Call of Duty until the small hours of the morning, Stiles dripping over the arm of the couch, and Derek lying upside down on the chair.  They talk in between rounds about Lacrosse, the Sheriff, school, and whatever else.  Stiles feels this buzz in his chest that he hasn’t felt in a long time.

They get sick of it around 3am and Derek breaks into his secret chocolate stash.

Stiles munches on a Hershey’s bar as he watches Derek pace in front of the kitchen windows.

“The moon is so cool this time of night,” Stiles says, licking chocolate from his fingers.

Derek crosses his arms and nods at golden sliver in the sky.  “Especially when it’s not full.”

Stiles stands on his knees and rests his elbows on the back of the sofa, facing Derek.  “What, you don’t like that all-powerful feeling coursing through your veins?  I would kill for that.”

Derek turns around slowly.  He laughs somewhere deep in his throat.  “No,” he breathes. “Because you’re not always… It’s not like you’re never vulnerable.”

“You could rip anyone’s throat out.”

“Wolfsbane,” Derek says, and then is silent.

Stiles stands and walks over to him, palms up in that universal, I’m-not-going-to-harm-you sort of way.

“Stiles,” he said, looking suddenly smaller.  “You have to know something.”

Stiles feels blood in his veins.  He’s awake.  He listens.

“It was a while ago.  _Years,_ I guess.  I was younger, and I didn’t understand a lot of things— and I’m not saying that’s a reason for any of this to happen, but.  Well.  There was wolfsbane and I _couldn’t move_ , and I didn’t _want it_ , but, like, even though I could’ve killed her just like that, I was _powerless_ ,” he rattles almost endlessly, like he’ll never have enough words to say what he means.

Stiles can feel an uneasiness return to him, but it’s almost as if it’s not the same chemical formula as before, not as potent as before.  But he’s still confused.

Derek is steely muscles and sureness.  Dark eyes and pursed lips.  Intimidation.

Derek is not _this._

“I should have told you a year ago, _years_ ago.”

Stiles can’t get words to leave him.

“I…I guess I know what it’s like to have to go through this alone, and I shouldn’t have made you when I knew…God, it’s almost like a second rape, isn’t it? That I made you suffer like this?”

Stiles shakes his head, clearing that pre-cry phlegm from his throat.  “No.”

“I’m sorry, Stiles.”

“It’s not your fault.”

Derek takes a moment.  Regains himself.  He wipes his eyes with his thumb and forefinger.  

“It’s not your fault,” Stiles says again, somehow realizing that they’re no longer talking about Derek’s guilt for not telling Stiles sooner—that it might be a kind of guilt that’s lived inside of Derek for years.

Eyebrows raised, Derek gives an incredulous, “ _I know_.”

Stiles steps forward.

And it’s not a kiss.  It’s the touch of lips together with an air of commiseration, this sympathy that is so deep that it’s almost in their DNA.  It’s the sharing of stories directly mouth to mouth, tongue to tongue. It’s touch that communicates words that were incomprehensible by their friends and loved ones.  It’s a prick of lingering pain.

It’s not just a kiss.

It’s an _understanding_.

 


End file.
